“I would’ve told her that [we] never talked much, or even looked at eachother, but it didn’t matter, because we were looking at the same sky together. Anybody can look at you. It’s quite rare to find someone who sees the same world you see.”
–Turtles All The Way Down by John Green
This week was a pretty good week, all things considering. The past couple of days I remembered what it’s like to fall in love with a book, and quite frankly, it’s been amazing. All of a sudden the words are popping off the pages and the images are plastered all over my mind in an array of scenes. The series of books called The Heroes of Olympus is a second series/a continuation of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, and I have started to reread book one: “The Lost Hero.” I think it’s amazing how the author, Rick Riordan, can create such loveable, relatable, and real characters. I haven’t been this excited to read a book since I read this series the first time in sixth grade.
With the prospect of sunny summer days and cloudless summer nights in the near future, I have hope. Hope for myself, hope for others, and hope for the world. I believe that hope and perspective are closely linked. My point of view affects my hope. The last week, my perspective on finishing this school year was not very high off of the ground and therefore, I was not very hopeful. Honestly all it took was one conversation to pull me back and give me a metaphorical slap in the face saying, “you got this, now go get your shit together.” Right now, I view summer as a new beginning and the next adventure I get to take on as I strive to make it the best in my life. This, in turn, translates into hope for me. Sometimes all it takes is a few words at the right time. It’s pretty amazing what a conversation can do for someone. Just a few tiny words, and bam, a new light is shed on something, an emotion changed, and a new perspective is gained. A conversation can be the difference between an error and a correction, a truth and a lie, darkness and light.
On sunny days like the one I’m writing this on I have only one desire: drive. I cannot wait to just get in my car and drive as far as the sun will let me before it sinks beneath the horizon. Practically all I dream of is driving with Hannah and getting lost together. I think that days like those are the best days. The ones where you wake up not knowing where your life will take you, and fall asleep under the stars with the best knowledge in the world…you have used time to your advantage, getting lost in the mind-mangle of your own good thoughts. The pressures of intrusive and unwanted thoughts are no longer swinging round after round in your brain like a batting cage, the baseballs rattling around like marbles. Instead, flags are raised high on flagpoles like victories. You have won.
Wishing you all the best,
Stan
Long Drives in the Dark 